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Acheron (Specops306)
Private corporations have a long history of trying to avoid UEG jurisdiction. Some use them as permanent employee housing, incentives to work exclusively for that company. The fact that, if they resign, they will lose their home and have to scrape together the money to travel to a more open colony is a strong disincentive to leave. Others keep them secret to avoid the authority of Colonial Authority Administration oversight, often as weapons development or research facilities. Others simply hope to avoid paying the mandatory colonial taxes. For whatever reason, it would not be until 2557 that the UNSC discovered that Acheron, in the Zeta Reticuli system, had been discovered and colonised, and that this colony had been destroyed before even the Insurrection. More importantly, rogue elements of ONI had returned to Acheron, establishing a biological weapons research facility. The exact circumstances, as well as much of the colony's history, would be uncovered by Operation: VENATOR, part of the larger Operation: VORAUSSICHT. History Officially, at least according to Weyland-Yutani Corporation records, Acheron was discovered in 2423, surveyed by the company as a source of argon and a potential base for mining Calpamos, the gas giant it orbits. Its distant proximity from any important colony or slipspace route, the inhospitable climate, and other discrepancies indicate that virtually any other colony would have been better suited for mining and refinery, even among the Inner Colonies, and that the expense to set up a colony made any settlement deeply unprofitable. Hadley's Hope, the first human settlement beyond the "Outer Rim" of UEG territory, what would come to be known as the "Outer Colonies", was established in 2453, intended as a base of operations for mining equipment and personnel. Although it made some progress over the next two decades, its efforts never produced much more than the gas by-products that were a result of the atmospheric converters, such as the argon that was plentiful in the atmosphere. By 2479, the processors had at least made the atmosphere breathable, though not entirely hospitable. Contact with the colony was lost in 2479, and the Weyland-Yutani Corporation was forced to officially requested Colonial Military Authority assistance. Tied up with the fledgling Insurrection among the Inner Colonies, the CMA sent a combat platoon on an automated light frigate, the CMA Sulaco, to investigate, along with a company official and a civilian advisor, Ellen Ripley, who claimed extraterrestrial influence, long before the discovery of the Covenant. Contact with this team would also be lost, though a subsequent investigation would find the colony destroyed by a thermonuclear explosion, likely from the colony's atmospheric processors. By now, the Insurrection was close to the tipping point, and the decision was made by high-ranked CMA officials to deem the colony as destroyed by anti-corporate terrorists. Weyland-Yutani would subsequently work very hard to erase all references to Acheron from the colonial navigation databanks, probably helped by corrupt CMA officers who resented the growing influence of the UNSC outside of Sol. The war with the Covenant would distract the UNSC from such practices for almost thirty years, but discrepancies would still be noticed, and in 2557 Operation: VORAUSSICHT, working on information provided by informants and from interrogation of prisoners, deployed the UNSC prowler ''Hunters Arrow'' carrying special forces personnel to Acheron to investigate, finding a small research facility, codenamed "Raptors Nest", presumed to be operated by resurgent Insurrectionists, as well as a corvette battlegroup in close orbit. It woul Features Acheron is one of several moons that orbit the Jovian gas giant Zeta2 Reticuli b, listed in Weyland-Yutani records as Calpamos. Acheron's close proximity to Calpamos has resulted in a situation roughly analogous to that of Jupiter's moon Io, the intense gravitational fluctuations producing tidal heating, leading to extremely active volcanism - much of the planet's surface, especially the side of the planet tidally locked to Calpamos, is covered in lava flows or deep gauges in the landscape that are the result of ancient flows that have subsided. The side opposite Calpamos is less inhospitable, and past terraforming has left it with a breathable, though not entirely comfortable, atmosphere. This side is also marked by the same evidence of ancient volcanic activity, etched in the dominant igneus strata, dominated by an unusual type of non-reflective obsidian. These gauges have left the landscape with virtually no level ground, and navigation is generally impossible over long distances except by air or by specially designed off-road vehicles, such as the M12 Force Application Vehicle. Arches, trenches, and ridges seem to have been chiselled out of the landscape, and are evidence that this side was also once volcanic. Temperatures on the outer face can reach -79 degrees Celsius, although the north and south polar regions, and a thin band between the inner and outer faces, form a narrow strip of land where temperatures are able to support human life with relative comfort. The geology of Acheron is highly unusual for several reasons. For one thing, it seems inconsistent - the side facing Calpamos is virtually molten, but the side facing away from it should not display the signs of volcanism that it does, or at least not to the same extent. For another, the extent to which obsidian dominates the natural rock types is strange - It is produced when felsic lava extruded from a volcano cools rapidly with minimum crystal growth. Obsidian is commonly found within the margins of rhyolitic lava flows known as obsidian flows, where the chemical composition (high silica content) induces a high viscosity and polymerization degree of the lava. This seems at odds with the volcanism of the other face of Acheron. Some geologists have proposed that the moon is not a native of the Zeta Reticuli system, but was an extrasolar traveller captured in Calpamos' orbit, which would explain the third anomalous fact about Acheron - its age. Radiocarbon dating shows Acheron to have formed approximately six billion years ago, while both stars of the system are estimated to be only two billion years old at most. Since the rediscovery of Acheron, fringe elements within ONI have proposed that the planetoid was moved out of its original system by an ancient spacefaring species to orbit Calpamos for extracting and refining hydrogen, also pointing out that extraterrestrial presence also explains the anomalous low levels of beryllium in the system's stars. These theories have been dismissed by mainstream analysts, despite the confirmed existence of advanced prehistoric civilisations, simply because of the inefficiency of doing so - why, if this was the case, not simply use an already present moon as their base? Why move one from another system entirely? A smaller but more serious group have proposed that the planetoid served not as a base but as a prison - it's precarious orbit could be destabilised if need be, sending it hurtling into the fiery heart of Calpamos. Given the nature of its "endemic" fauna, ONI has been less reluctant to dismiss this. Fauna For the most part, Acheron is uninhabited, and extremely hostile to multicellular life, wavering between the two extremes of molten, and even the thin habitable zone has yielded only fossilised unicellular life forms. Some extremophile life forms have been discovered in both the extreme heat of the inner face, and the freezing cold of the outer face, though xenobiologists are not satisfied that these are truly native to the moon given some similarities to micro-organisms discovered on Minorca and Ares IV. There is, to the extent of UNSC knowledge, only one multicellular species endemic to the planetoid, and even these are doubted to be native to this planet, or even this galaxy - Internecivus raptus, also known as Linguafoeda acheronsis, more commonly known as the "Xenomorph". Quotes *"You ever hear the phrase "Hell on Earth"? Imagine that, and then multiply it by 100%." *"Zeta2 Reticuli is approximately two billion years old - Acheron, on the other hand, can be dated at around six billion years. So either radiocarbon dating has some flaws, which we've disproved, or it pre-dates the stars it orbits." *"Who'd want to colonise this rock? There's absolutely nothing there to make it worthwhile - except maybe it unique animal life." Category:Non-aligned worlds